Compréhension orale

Thirty-nine questions, thirty-five minutes, and one play each

The listening paper punishes hesitation more than any other section: the clip plays once, and while you are still deciding on question 12, question 13 has already started. Practising it is as much about rhythm as comprehension.

Practise listening Sit a listening mock 3 free writing + 3 free speaking corrections

Questions: 39
Total time: 35 min
Plays per clip: 1
Score range: 331 - 699

Why listening scores lag behind the others

Most candidates who have studied French can read far above the level they can listen at. Reading gives you as long as you want on a sentence; the listening paper gives you one pass at natural speed, often with a Québécois accent you have rarely met.

The fix is volume and pacing rather than grammar. Full papers, sat end to end, teach you to let a missed question go — the single behaviour that stops one lost answer from becoming four.

39 questions in 35 minutes: under a minute each, audio included.
Marked on the server, with the reasoning behind every correct answer.
Every attempt is kept in your history, so the pacing improvement becomes visible.

What the paper throws at you

Short exchanges first, then announcements, interviews and reports — getting longer and faster as the paper goes on.

Questions

35 min

Total time

Questions rise in difficulty: the first ten are short everyday exchanges, the last ten are extended documents.
Accents vary on purpose — Quebec French, European French, African and Belgian speakers all appear.
You cannot go back. A question left blank stays blank, so answering something always beats answering nothing.

What the practice papers give you

Full-length papers, in the exam's order of rising difficulty, marked the way the exam marks them.

Marked on the server

The score in your history is the score you got — nothing is computed in the browser, so a refresh cannot improve it.

The right answer, explained

Every question comes back with the reasoning, including why the distractor you chose was built to look right.

Timed or untimed

Practice mode marks each question as you answer it; test mode holds everything back until you hand in, on the exam's clock.

How the practice works

Four steps, from a cold paper to a score you can rely on.

1
Choose a paper
Full-length papers at the exam's question count, ordered from easiest to hardest the way the exam orders them.
2
Practice or test mode
Practice marks each answer as you give it; test mode runs the clock and reveals nothing until you hand in.
3
See every answer explained
Not just the correct option — why it is correct, and what the other three were designed to catch.
4
Track the score across papers
Every attempt is kept, so the number that matters — how you do in the last ten questions — becomes visible.

How to practise listening properly

Four habits that move a listening score faster than more vocabulary does.

Practise listening

1
Read the question before the clip starts. Knowing what is being asked halves what you need to catch.
2
Never replay during a mock. Replaying teaches you to understand the clip; the exam asks you to understand it once.
3
Listen to Radio-Canada, not to French courses. The exam's Quebec accents and everyday speed are the thing you are training for.
4
Let a lost question go immediately. Chasing it is how candidates lose the next two as well.

Frequently asked questions

Thirty-nine, in rising order of difficulty, over 35 minutes.

No. Each recording plays once, which is what makes pacing so much of the exercise.

A deliberate mix — Quebec French alongside European, African and Belgian speakers — because the exam tests comprehension of French, not of one region's French.

Yes, and you should — particularly on the longer documents at the end, where a name, a number or a date is often the answer.